by JAIME C. HARRIS AmNews Sports Editor
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone continues to inscribe her name among the greatest track and field athletes of all-time. And the New Jersey native, who was born in New Brunswick and raised in Dunellen, less than 40 miles from Manhattan, is just 24.
On Sunday at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field trials at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field, McLaughlin-Levrone, who regularly competed as a scholastic prodigy at the Nike Track & Field Center at The Armory in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan as student attending Union Catholic Regional High School, blazed a time of 50.65 in the women’s 400-meter hurdles finals to set a new world record. Anna Cockrell and Jasmine Jones were a distant second and third respectively to earn spots on the United States’ women’s 400-meter hurdles Olympic team.
McLaughlin-Levrone’s father, Willie McLaughlin, was a star in his own right out of East Orange High School before becoming a three-time All-American track performer at Manhattan College. And her mother, Mary McLaughlin was a noted high school distance runner while at Cardinal O’Hara High School in Tonawanda, New York near Buffalo. The young star will now endeavor to win her second consecutive 400-meter hurdles Olympics gold in Paris, France, when the opening heats begin on August 4 with the finals scheduled for August 8.
She was the champion in the event at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, held in the summer of 2021 after a one-year postponement due the global COVID-19 pandemic, crossing the finish line in a the world record time of 51.46. Subsequently, McLaughlin-Levrone lowered the mark to 51.41 in June 2022 at Hayward Field at the USATF Championships and set a new standard just one month later back on the same track, winning the World Championships in 50.68.
McLaughlin-Levrone is also one of the sport’s preeminent 400-meter runners, having been a member of the United States gold medal contingent in the 4×400 meter relays at the Tokyo Olympics, a dazzling quartet composed of her, Allyson Felix, 800-meter specialist and fellow New Jersey product Athing Mu, and Dalilah Muhammad,, who was born and raised in Jamaica, Queens, and starred for Benjamin Cardozo High School. Additionally, McLaughlin-Levrone ran her personal best in the 200 (22.07) this year.
The 34-year-old Muhammad, who won gold in 2016 in the women’s 400-meter hurdles at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics, announced that Sunday was her last Olympic trials race as she finished the finals in sixth place.